


out of body

by chininiris



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Temporary Character Death, this would be the au in which no one dies in the war but shikamaru goes and dies later :')
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-03
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2020-07-30 15:56:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20099785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chininiris/pseuds/chininiris
Summary: He’s surprised when she stops before his grave, pink carnations cradled in her arm, and kneels down on the grass. She doesn’t say anything for the longest time, just staring at his name, flowers swaying in the breeze.“Hey... I hope everything’s fine. As fine as they can be.” Sakura lays the bouquet on the ground, delicate as if it might shatter. “It’s still odd to walk around and not see you lying on your back, staring up at the clouds. The Hokage office is so empty, too. I wonder... If you’re in a good place right now?”“I’m right here,”he says, but she doesn’t listen.On a mission gone wrong, Shikamaru’s soul is separated from his body. He wonders if this is his fate now, to be a ghost stranded among the living.





	1. when you find you're invisible

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LindtLuirae](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LindtLuirae/gifts).

> This is for a private Shikasaku exchange. Bouncy, apologies for the wait, but I finally worked out where this will go. I hope you'll find this enjoyable! 
> 
> Now if only my muse wouldn't evade me. Pls call me back, I need to finish the second half

Heavy rain with booming thunder and lightning streaking the sky makes the perfect condition for an ambush, he thinks, and this is so damn cliché that Shikamaru would have laughed if he weren’t in so much pain. 

He can barely feel the soppy ground beneath his cheek, or the blood oozing from the gaping wound and from his mouth, mixing with rainwater and dirt and trickling away. His fingers and toes are getting colder, teeth chattering, lips tinged blue. By now, his eyesight is just a sliver of light and clarity in murky darkness, the ringing in his ears so loud it’s deafening. He thinks he’s being moved, thinks he feels a faint warmth on his side where he’d been striked. 

Shikamaru can’t register anything aside from the pain. 

A bright flash of color - _ Ino _ , his slipping mind supplies, _ that’s Ino _ \- soaked blonde hair and desperate blue eyes. He almost smiles; she must be talking so loud.

Choji fills his vision next, then Asuma, and Shikamaru shouts as he’s picked up and the wound protests against the rough treatment. Something wheezes past his face, the flash of lightning catching on the metal surface, and the ribcage he’s pressed against rumbles with a curse. 

“Leave him,” comes the reluctant words from one of them, followed by loud protests and a clash of weapons. 

“No choice,” says another voice, strangled with deep regret and guilt. 

Next thing he knows, the chaos around him subsides to a sudden calmness, just him and the rain and the petrichor rising from the ground. _ I’m sorry _, the words cling to his ears, repeating themselves like a mantra. The pain seems to give up as his body goes lax against something hard and uncomfortable. The others are safe.

Shikamaru smiles.

* * *

He finds his way back to Konoha three days later, just a ghostly form of the bright man he used to be, his tattered body left behind somewhere in Kawa. Shikamaru stands in the middle of the market street, watching people going on with their lives as he debates on his next move. Certainly, the funeral must have already happened. Good, he has no desire to see an empty casket. 

Shikamaru starts down the path to the Nara district, definitely not his smartest decision in life, but he can’t not visit his parents. Delaying this would only hurt more, so he steels himself for the inevitable and walks on. 

The street of his home has always been quiet, but the stillness in the air could have given him chills had he been here physically. A hush settles heavily over the houses, broken only by the gentle rustling of leaves, which only makes the atmosphere more depressing. He doesn’t look into the other homes, heading straight for the main house and passing through the fence around the neatly tended garden. 

Not much could have changed in the seventy two hours between unfastening his spirit from his body and the long march home, and it brings him some sort of comfort to be here and find everything untouched. The koi fish swimming in the pond bring him a sense of peace, the familiar walls making him feel welcomed and whole. He doesn’t make a sound as he crosses the grassy patch towards the engawa, and force of habit has him trying to toe off his shoes before entering his home.

The outside is deceiving, masking what awaits inside. Grief hangs heavy in the air and settles low in his throat like a knot, making it hard to swallow or breathe, actions he keeps on doing for the sake of trying to feel alive. Incense burns in a room from beside a framed picture of him, one of the rare ones where he’d smiled. 

Shikamaru finds his parents in the kitchen, sitting silent across from one another, his dad nursing a glass of water and his mom with her head in her hands. There are dried tear tracks in her face, and his dad has deep shadows under his eyes. Shikamaru feels something being ripped from his chest as he sits down on one of the vacant chairs, nails digging into his palms as he watches his unmoving parents. He doesn’t want to wonder how long they’ve been here like this or how hard it had hit them the moment they received the news, but he can’t quite stop himself from thinking about it.

As much as he wants to stay with his family and clan, the atmosphere is so distressing he needs to leave. Shikamaru flees the district like it’s been set on fire, with nowhere in mind as his next destination. He only stops when he is far enough, waiting for that usual feeling of being short of breath that doesn’t come.

The next home that comes to mind is Asuma’s, but with Kurenai pregnant and his apparent death on top of it, Shikamaru doesn’t want to intrude. His teacher has enough on his plate as is. 

Between his other teammates, he goes to Ino’s house next, the apartment located above her family’s flower shop. Her mom is handling business, chatting with two young girls looking through flowers on display, and her father is presumably out in the Intelligence Division building for another day of work. Shikamaru heads to the back of the shop,something akin to a cold chill resonating within as he traverses through walls and other objects. 

Ino’s home is deadly quiet when he enters, the ever present flower bouquets failing to lift up the dark mood trapped in these walls. He creeps through the living room and down the hall towards her bedroom like a floorboard might creak beneath his non existent weight, and rests his hand on the doorknob, metal passing through the limb. 

Shikamaru walks in, empty breath trapped in his lungs. Ino sits curled into herself on the bed, knees hugged towards her chest, long hair hanging behind her back as an unkempt, oily mess. She looks tired, with deep shadows under her dim eyes and exhaustion pouring from every pore of her body. The curtains are only partially open, allowing inside a stream of sunlight. The picture of their team on her nightstand is turned face down. 

He leaves not too long after, finding the atmosphere to be as unbearable as his home’s. Chouji’s house is his last hope, and Shikamaru can only hope the ambient will be lighter there, for he doesn’t want to be alone right now. Not more than he already is.

Chouji can be found alone in his kitchen, a bag of chips lying at arm’s length away, untouched. His eyes are red-rimmed, but he looks rested enough, and for that Shikamaru is glad. His mom is preparing two cups of tea by the sink, the special calming blend made by Yoshino. It has always worked to soothe Chouji’s nerves.

Shikamaru takes one of the vacant chairs for himself. He’ll stay here for a while.

* * *

Team 10 visits his headstone in the graveyard on one sunny afternoon, an arrangement of white blooms in Ino’s arms. It’s the first time Shikamaru sees Asuma since the failed mission, and his teacher’s lips are tightly pressed together, his usual cigarette tucked in the pocket of his jounin vest. 

It’s quiet for a while, just them and the gentle rustle of the blades of grass. Ino crouches down to place the flowers on top of the grave, tracing his name with a nail, pale blue polish cracked still. 

“I wish we could go back.” Chouji breaks the silence, a waver in his soft voice. “Get his body back.” 

Asuma places a hand on his student’s shoulder and gives it a firm, comforting squeeze. “Me too.” He gives Chouji a wane smile. “I’ve spoken to the Hokage. He doesn’t think it will be possible now as the area has been compromised, but... He will try to get him back.”

Ino sniffles, running the back of her hand along the underside of her nose. “I’ll have Sakura annoy him until he brings Shikamaru here.” 

“How’s she feeling?” Asuma inquires, brow furrowed. “They used to work together in some missions and assignments for the Hokage, didn’t they?”

She lets out a wet chuckle, wiping at her eyes. “She’s taking it harder than I expected.” Ino accepts the handkerchief offered by Chouji with a grateful smile and dabs at her face. “The last time I saw her like that was when we were kids, when Sasuke left.”

Asuma’s lips quirk up. “It’s a good thing you two are spending a lot of time together. That way you can both heal.” 

“Yeah, I guess so.” She looks down at the grave and scrunches up her face, voice unsteady and breaking. “Why did it have to be him?” Chouji moves in to sweep her up in his arms. “Why couldn’t I do anything?”

Shikamaru turns away from the sight, eyes shut tight.

* * *

He doesn’t stray far from his family and teammates. Being away from them, wandering through a crowded market street looking at people whose names he doesn’t know, makes Shikamaru feel a lot more lonely, a lot more like a nobody, another shinobi that died and won’t be missed by the civilians.

Shikamaru was never that much of a sociable person, preferring to stay on his own surrounded by quietness most of the time, but now the thought of it is unbearable. 

Yoshino is in their gardens tending to the plants, face still pinched with the grief that refuses to leave her alone. Gardening helps, and she’s been meticulously tugging at weeds and watering the new flower bushes she purchased on a whim a few days ago. 

Shikamaru lounges under the shade of a tree, watching her. Force of habit has him trying to nibble on a piece of grass, but there’s nothing between his teeth. He doesn’t feel anything, not the warmth of the sunshine, not the coolness of the breeze. Or the bite of his nails into his palms, the stiffness of his joints after keeping his hands fisted for too long, the rush of air in his lungs when his ribcage expands, or the itchiness on his nose from so much pollen in the air. 

He swings the foot of the leg propped up on a bent knee, a motion that’s born out of a deep sense of restlessness that’s taking too long to ease. It’s hard to accept that he’s dead, the hardest truth he has to swallow. At least, cloud watching still brings him a sense of comfort, even if he’s just a spectre.

His mom stands up from where she’d been kneeling and wanders back into the house for a gardening tool she’d forgotten. Despite her nagging tendencies, Yoshino is the kind of person that stays quiet when alone or deeply concentrated, but now her silence is almost unnatural. 

What he wouldn’t give to have her bothering him again. 

Sighing, he sits up from his reclined position and stares at the moving shadows of the canopies, the very things he used to control. This technique had prevented many unwanted deaths, but not his own. Not this time.

He wonders... 

At this point in life - well, afterlife he presumes - Shikamaru barely needs to concentrate to use most of his clan’s Hiden techniques. Chakra would flow and transform, allow him to manipulate his own shadows, stretch them in the space between him and his target. It almost feels like feels like it’s working, like there’s chakra flowing within this incorporeal form. 

Opening his eyes, Shikamaru is surprised to see his own elongated shadow connected with that of the bright orange watering can.

It works.

* * *

Since his discovery, he’s been more and more determined to find a way to return to his body. The first step is trying to feel it, try to find the thread that keeps his soul bound to his body. It’s hard and he hasn’t succeeded yet, but he’s not going to give up. 

He doesn’t have much in Konoha, but Shikamaru wants to go back to the few people who care. 

Sakura is visiting Ino today. In the living room, they sit by the low table and paint each other’s nails an obnoxious bright color, tea and cookies not too far away, some song playing from the stereo. Their meetups used to be louder, livelier. This is unlike them, the quietness save for the music. Shikamaru remembers them talking a mile a minute whenever they met. 

As of now, Sakura is telling her about some cases she’s seen in the hospital, the electric blue of her nails a courtesy of Ino. “That sounds rough.” Ino says and brings her hand up to eye level to inspect the work done. “How did you handle it?”

“We had to take turns.” Sakura starts on the other hand, painting the nails a neon orange. “It took us longer than expected, but he’s safe now. He’ll live.” 

Ino nods, silent. Shikamaru watches from the lone armchair, frowning when he recognizes the look his teammate has on her face. Sakura must recognize it too, for she gives Ino a look that says _ go on _ as she closes the nail polish bottle. But their friend takes her time, mulling it over in her head, debating.

Sakura lets her, sips the tea and nibbles on a cookie, carefully looking over their box of manicure supplies for something he never bothered to learn the name of. By the time she retrieves a clear bottle from within, Ino has steeled herself. 

“I’m going to join the Analysis Team.” 

Shikamaru, if he could, would have choked in his own spit then, and he does feel something awfully similar even though his throat is okay. _ How could he have missed this? _ In contrast to him sitting up abruptly where he’d been slouched, Sakura only widens her eyes in response to her friend’s revelation.

“You be a great addition to their team,” she tells Ino with an encouraging smile. It’s almost odd to not see them bickering, but grief brings people closer and changes them, he supposes. “Why, though?”

Ino inhales deeply and curls her hands into fists. Sakura makes a slight noise of defeat, resigning herself to starting over. “I want to find out who did it.” Ino hisses through gritted teeth, some of her pain transforming into anger. “I want every single one of them to pay.” 

Apprehension flickers in Sakura’s eyes then, and Shikamaru can’t blame her for it. She’s lost a teammate to revenge, once; he can’t imagine how hard it will hit her if the same happens to a best friend. 

“Joining the Analysis Team sounds like a good idea.” She takes Ino’s hand in hers, rubbing over the ruined nails with a damp piece of cotton. “It will open a new path in your life and all that, provide a distraction from... Well. But if you’re joining for that...” Sighing, she keeps her eyes on their hands. “I know I can’t stop you. Just... Be careful, okay?”

Ino smiles wide, eyes bright with unshed tears. “Aw, Forehead, don’t make me emotional.” Sakura laughs, weak and choked, and sets the cotton aside so she can return Ino’s hug. “Don’t worry about that, okay? I’ve spoken to dad, Chouji and Asuma-sensei. Our families will work together.”

Sakura nods, holding on to her tight. Ino returns the gesture. In spite of the news he’s just heard, Shikamaru finds himself smiling.

They will heal together.

* * *

In the waiting room of the infirmary wing, the three of them wait impatiently for a nurse to come. Technically, Shikamaru could have gone into the room as well, but just because he’s a ghost doesn’t mean he’s forgotten the meaning of privacy.

He stays there with Ino and Chouji, the latter of which would be eating through a half bag of chips per minute under normal circumstances, but given their current setting, all he can do is bite his nails or his lip. Ino isn’t much better, tapping her foot on the floor and glancing at the clock on the wall every fifteen seconds. Shikamaru himself is pacing the length of the room to burn out his nervousness and failing miserably at that.

They’ve been here for hours, but someone finally takes mercy on them, a short haired brunette dressed in the pale blue scrubs of the hospital rounding around the corner. “You may come in.”

She doesn’t need to prompt them further, Ino all but leaping from her seat to follow the nurse to Kurenai’s room. They can hear Sakura’s voice from the outside, the soothing and happy tone she reserves to mothers. She’s standing opposite of Asuma by Kurenai’s bedside, her own lab coat dirtied with some blood.

“I’ll give you a moment.” She smiles at the couple and them- at Ino and Chouji on the way out, passing so close by Shikamaru he could have felt her perfume were he alive. 

He turns back to Asuma, pale in the face but grinning wide, cooing at the bundle of blankets in Kurenai’s arms. Hair damp, she looks exhausted, but still smiles down at their child, eyes creasing at the corners. Ino and Chouji rush to their side with hushed congratulations, and Shikamaru steps closer as well. 

The baby has a head full of black hair, chubby rosy cheeks and tiny fists, sleeping contently in Kurenai’s embrace. “It’s a girl,” she whispers, hugging the baby closer.

“Mirai,” Asuma supplies as Ino delicately reaches out to tug the blanket out of the way.

“She’s beautiful.” Her eyes well up, and Chouji isn’t so far behind, having been brought to tears as well. 

For a while, they just huddle around Kurenai’s bed, watching Mirai sleep so peacefully. Kurenai asks them to tell her team as soon as they return from the last minute mission assigned to them, and no one else dares break the silence.

Chouji inhales sharply, giving voice to what they have all been thinking. “I wish he could have seen this.” 

Asuma nods, lips tightly pressed together. Shikamaru would have liked to babysit her in the weekends, too. 

* * *

It doesn’t come to Shikamaru as a surprise to see Chouji tentatively dancing around a girl that works as waitress in his favorite barbeque place. Asuma has teased him about it for the longest time, and his friend’s reddening cheeks only confirmed that his friend was infatuated. 

Aiko is a sweet girl of brown skin and green eyes, her curly dark hair tied away from her face. She gives Chouji endearing smiles when he comes around and stops by to chat after rush hours when he comes alone for a late lunch. On his part, Chouji only seems to like her more and more, easily turning into a blushing mess when she compliments him on something. 

Shikamaru always knew he’d find himself a loving partner. 

It’s cute to see him working up the courage to ask her out, and Shikamaru accompanies him in his quest to buy a gift for their first date, standing by the sidelines as Chouji picks through the store for the best box of chocolates. He walks Chouji to her house and returns to his friend’s home afterwards, waiting for his return to hear him gush about it to himself later. 

Chouji is the perfect gentleman, chivalrous. It takes time until he kisses her for the first time, and Aiko melts in his arms. Shikamaru, for all he’d been supportive of his friend going after his crush, realizes then that they are moving on without him. All of them. They never forget, but life in Konoha continues to move forward whether he is there or not, and for the first time he doesn’t know how to feel about it. 

His friends’ routines are changing. With Chouji dating, Ino working hard to join the Analysis Team, and Asuma now raising Mirai, Shikamaru feels like there is no space left for him in their lives. Even his own parents aren’t the same anymore, finding new hobbies and duties to keep them busy and to forget the pain. 

He’s had no such luck in tracking his body either. Nothing thrums the connection when he reaches out, like there’s only empty space on the other side waiting to be found. Shikamaru wonders if this is his fate now, to be a ghost stranded among the living, his body rotting in some part of Kawa or completely destroyed by the hands of their enemies. 

Aiko laces her graceful fingers with Chouji’s callused, bigger ones and gives him a smile so sweet one could get cavities. He’s going to take her to a restaurant to introduce her to the rest of the team. 

Shikamaru stays put as they walk away. Maybe it’s time for him to move on as well.

* * *

The next morning brings him back to the graveyard, to the foot of his headstone. Shikamaru doesn’t know how long he stands there, looking at his own name etched on stone, but it doesn’t matter much to him. He’s got all the time in the world now that he’s dead.

It’s a quiet day with only a few people visiting loved ones that were lost, some of them walking close enough that he gets to hear the prayers and words muttered under their breaths. He was never fond of graveyards, but with nowhere else to go, it seems fitting that a ghost would settle here where it should belong. 

As dusk falls and the long shadows start blending with the upcoming darkness, someone enters the empty graveyard. Shikamaru could recognize her from a mile away, the pink of her hair easily distinguishable in a crowd. She’s skilled enough to hold a jutsu for hours effortlessly, changing the color to something more common when they went on undercover missions together. 

He’s surprised when she stops before his grave, pink carnations cradled in her arm, and kneels down on the grass. She doesn’t say anything for the longest time, just staring at his name, flowers swaying in the breeze.

“Hey... I hope everything’s fine. As fine as they can be.” Sakura lays the bouquet on the ground, delicate as if it might shatter. “It’s still odd to walk around and not see you lying on your back, staring up at the clouds. The Hokage office is so empty, too. I wonder... If you’re in a good place right now?”

_ “I’m right here,” _he says, but she doesn’t listen. Regardless of his beliefs about the afterlife, Shikamaru hadn’t expected to be left to roam among the living when he died. 

“I suppose now you can gaze at the clouds without being bothered.” Her laugh is a weak, broken thing. “That should be nice.”

He watches her kneeled there, hands fisted and resting on her lap, brow furrowed in concentration. She’s doing what she can to not cry here and now. Shikamaru wonders how many times she’s cried over him. Sakura has always been so empathetic. 

“Kakashi-sensei is trying to bring you back home. I am helping your dad and Asuma-sensei too. We’re confident we can find... Something to bring back, even if it’s just your vest or dog tags.” She takes a shuddering breath and lowers her head. “I wish we could bring _ you _ back. Alive.” 

After a few tears fall despite her efforts, Sakura recomposes herself enough to tell his grave of the things he’s witnessed this past week. How he’d missed that she’s been visiting his grave since the funeral, he doesn’t know, nor does he know why she keeps coming here. He was a distant friend at best, a coworker sometimes or a teammate when Kakashi deemed their combined brains and skills were necessary. 

“My favorite duo.” He would say, eyes crinkling as he smiled beneath the mask and pushed forth the scroll containing their next assignment. “I have a new one for you.” 

Shikamaru doesn’t know why she’s here, but he’s glad she keeps coming back.

As Sakura stands to go back home, he follows her.

* * *

There’s a pattern to her days, a routine to follow that is easy to follow along. Wake up early in the morning, workout, shower, have breakfast (something quick and simple like oats or toast), go to the hospital, work. And work. And work. Go back home, shower again, have dinner, maybe read some med scroll before bed, then sleep. 

Always like that.

Shikamaru has never seen someone as dedicated to their job as Sakura. Usually, people try to run away from working late and filling in for a peer. Sakura just runs away from the graveyard shift, but accepts everything else.

He can’t imagine why she buries herself in her work, but then again, it’s none of his business. He’s content to just follow her around and have someone to keep him a kind of pseudo company, someone who wouldn’t make him feel like he’s intruding in their changing lives.

In her days off, she meets up with Sai and Yamato for lunch after cleaning up her home, and Kakashi finds a way to ditch his responsibilities to join them. In Ichiraku, they read the latest letter sent by Naruto (and Sasuke) and write a reply. In the afternoon, she’ll either sleep for hours or pamper herself to manicure, and in the evening she meets with one of the girls, or all of them, for drinks and a good meal. 

And so life goes, the same things every day. It’s easy to settle in her routine and watch her studying patient cases in between one appointment and the next. He never goes into the room (again, privacy) and waits patiently outside to follow her to their next destination.

In many ways, he feels a lot like a dog, but it’s better than wandering around by himself. 

He’s been “living” with her for a few weeks now and has gotten to know most of her quirks. Sakura has a specific mug for coffee, a matte black one with a sloth in the front and a bad pun; another mug for tea, blue and shiny with a fox in a patch of flowers; and another one she only uses occasionally, white with a big yellow cat in the center. The mugs she offers to anyone who visits are plain in comparison.

She has a lot of plants and possesses a green thumb that could give Ino a run for her money, or maybe she learned all the tricks from her best friend. The succulents and pothos thrive in her apartment, their bright leaves hanging from shelves and stools. 

She orders the books on her shelf by size, and likes to curl up in her couch with a fluffy red blanket. Her pillow has to be a certain way before she lies her head upon it, and the side of her bedsheets with tags has to be tucked under the mattress by the foot of the bed. She likes to listen to music when showering and sings awfully off-key; he can hear it from the living room.

All of these things are so ridiculous, but they are so _ Sakura _ at the same time that they become almost endearing. 

* * *

Shikamaru is not giving up.

He will not give up until he finds a way to return to his body. It would be extremely helpful if he could look into similar cases, but he can’t touch books or scrolls, so there’s no viable way for him to research. He loses track of time of how long he sits around in the hospital or her house trying to come up with solutions, trying to reach out and feel, trying to recall what had killed him in the first place.

Giving up is not an option, though. There has to be a way! Maybe if they find his body, she and Tsunade can restore it somehow? That has to be possible. At this point, he’s getting desperate for anything. 

In the meantime, he sits in her living room, playing with the shadows of her billowing curtains as she’s studying a scroll. Sakura has been doing this a lot lately, coming home with tomes and scrolls and whatever else she can get her hands on and spending hours and hours pouring over them. He never bothered to check the titles or themes, but her diligence is inspiring.

Wistful, he smiles as she writes down some annotations on a notepad, hand moving quickly to get it all down as soon as possible. Her speed turns against her when the pencil flies from her grip and clatters to the ground, rolling away from her reach.

Sighing, she stands up and walks over to retrieve it, bending down. And pauses. Shikamaru notices that the pencil stopped at the tip of one of his elongated tendrils of shadow he’d been playing with to pass time, and Sakura squeezes her eyes shut with a shuddering breath before picking up her pencil.

He retreats the shadows before she opens her eyes.

She doesn’t look at the ground again.

* * *

One day, she’s buying groceries in the market street when a bunch of rambunctious kids run by, one of them tripping on his own feet, scraping his knee on the hard ground.

It’s a shallow wound, the kind that stings like hell to clean and aches for the remainder of the day, becoming tender to the touch the next day. It’s the kind of injury his mom would diligently clean when he was younger, place a band-aid over it and kiss it better even as she was reprimanding him for running around before allowing him to slip away and go back to play with Chouji. 

He might have said it was annoying countless times, but damn if it didn’t make him feel better. 

Sakura forgets all about shopping and turns to the sniffling kid, healing the scrape with a touch of her glowing hand. A few seconds later and his knee is unblemished. The kid gives her a wide grin that shows the gap where one of his front teeth is missing and hurries away with his friends after thanking her. 

She picks up her basket and smiles, and as Shikamaru watches her, he realizes not for the first time that she has one of the biggest hearts of their group. It’s no wonder she brings him flowers every week even after so long has passed.

Later, when she complains that she forgot to buy some ingredient for her dinner, she might blame it on the kid, but she will never truly mean it.

* * *

Shikamaru feels like he’s playing with fire, but her reaction from the other day won’t leave his mind. 

In her office in the hospital, Sakura is reading some medical reports as he’s perched on the windowsill, watching. He hasn’t done anything since, and right now might not be the best time for her, but the sun is low and the shadows are long. It’s easy to send a tendril close to her on the desktop, stopping just beside the hand that rests on the flatwood. 

He holds it and waits. Sakura is deeply concentrated on the report, murmuring a few things to herself, one of the serious cases from S rank missions gone wrong. 

When she puts down the report, it’s impossible to miss the unnatural placement of the shadow. She blinks and presses her fingers to the inner corners of her eyes, murmuring a heartfelt “Fuck.” 

Curiosity sated, he pulls back the shadow and observes as she searches around the desk for it, as if it were a pesky bug that could have run away. Not long after, Sakura stands and heads outside, taking her lab coat off as she goes. “Misaki-san,” she calls for one of the nurses in the reception desk. “I’m going home.” 

Misaki takes a bewildered look at the clock on her desk. Sakura never leaves early.

* * *

Sakura isn’t the little girl dreaming of romance she used to be in their genin days anymore. Time and war do that to a person. She’s got her priorities, a demanding job, and no desire for dating at all, it seems. Shikamaru remembers how Ino would often rant to him about it, as if he had anything to do with Sakura’s love life, that Sakura was wasting her time and youth by not going out on dates with the friends Ino thought she’d like. 

Arguing with Ino about it usually led him nowhere, so he let her rant freely. 

Shikamaru was never one to go on dates, finding them too much of a hassle and troublesome, but that never stopped Ino from trying to find him good dates from her circle of friends/gossipers. He knows she still does the same to Sakura, and so his heart goes out to her. He can sympathize with what it is like to have Ino play matchmaker, one of the few things he and Sakura had in common. 

One weekend night when Ino is out of town on a minor mission and the other girls are busy, Sakura curls up in her couch in that same fluffy crimson blanket, mug of tea in one hand and bowl of snacks in the other, to watch some rerun of her favorite chick flick. She may not dream of romance, but some part of her wants it still, it seems. 

He finds the movie boredom inducing, but Sakura enjoys every part of it, giggling and making comments to herself. Personally, Shikamaru finds it more interesting to watch her instead, and snorts quietly to himself as she does bad impersonations of the characters, reciting scenes line by line like she was the one acting or the one who wrote the script. 

In overall, it’s a funny movie, and not the dramatic kind that makes you hold your breath and cry out in frustration. Still, as the movie ends with some happy tune, Sakura is abnormally quiet on the couch, tracing the rim of the mug with a fingertip. 

Shikamaru doesn’t know what to think of her silence, watching her from the other couch, hands clasped tightly together in the space between his knees. He wants to reach out, to ask her what’s wrong, for once offer some comfort and maybe do it right. But things get stranger still when she bolts upright and flees to her room, a choked sob left in her wake. Still worried, he wants to check up on her, but doesn’t want to intrude. 

He sits alone in the living room, listening to her unintelligible sobs and feeling something clench inside him. 

* * *

Shikamaru doesn’t know when it happened. By the time he realizes there’s something off with himself, it’s already too late to pinpoint the beginning. Were he alive, he would have chalked it up to being sick or being under the influence of a jutsu, but given his current state, that’s not possible.

So he has to face the music and admit that he likes Sakura. Like _ that. _

It’s a foreign feeling that took him too long to understand, an occurrence that would have Ino pestering him about it for weeks. Shikamaru was never one to have crushes or infatuations, and only ever really befriended a select group of girls from his innercircle, not bothering to approach anyone else. The girls from Konoha 11, along with Temari, fit that group.

Maybe he’s feeling lonely, neglected, touch starved even, he reasons, because he never had interest in a girl before when he was alive, so why now? But as he watches Sakura dancing around her house as she’s cleaning her things, he knows that he feels like this because it’s _ her. _

Shikamaru remembers meeting her for the first time when Ino brought her over to her birthday party. She was quiet and shy and wouldn’t leave Ino’s side for nothing in the world. Chouji tried to get her to open up, receiving tentative smiles sometimes, and in hindsight Shikamaru sees he could have been less aloof and more welcoming. 

He saw her go from that to a kid sure of herself to another girl like Ino, so infatuated with Sasuke it was unreal, and then saw her overcome her own limits and become Tsunade’s apprentice, surpass her sensei and master chakra control. Her growth always struck a sense of awe in others, himself included. She came from a family of civilians and turned into one of the most powerful kunoichi in the world, becoming an inspiration to many young kids. 

He wants to see his family again, meet with his friends, care for Mirai, to _ be with Sakura _. But with no body, that isn’t happening anytime soon.

What a terrible time to have a crush on someone, really.

* * *

He might have broken her, he thinks. 

Shikamaru isn’t using his shadows to be mean; he’s actually trying to communicate with her, though his attempts are flawed, but with every try Sakura grows more agitated. 

The research books pile on her desk, and still he doesn’t dare to go near them, and still she’s there spending hours upon hours reading, writing, pondering. Ino comes over more than once to try to drag her outside, but Sakura quickly comes back, and eventually Ino is dragged into it as well. 

It’s surprising, to say the least. 

Right now, a stretch of shadow is connected to a picture of Konoha 11 on her wall beside a hanging pothos plant. Sakura first noticed it as she was coming back from the kitchen after leaving her empty tea mug in the sink, and nearly flung herself to the wall in her haste to inspect it closely.

“Stop it!” She slaps her hand on the wall. Were it chakra infused, she’d easily broken through it. “Why are you doing this?” 

She’s not talking to him, but it feels a lot like it, almost like she’s cursing him. Her palm smacks the wall a few times, and her thumb rubs over the shadow as if trying to clean it away like a stubborn stain. Sakura lets a growl through gritted teeth and continues to fight it, her complaints and huffs soon starting to break. 

When she grows tired, Sakura steps back and stares at the painting in silence, breathing heavily, hands hanging by her sides. Wondering, Shikamaru makes to take one of hers in his hand, and startles when she flinches away, clutching it to her chest.

“What...?” She looks right at him then, and hope surges up before crashing down as her red rimmed eyes start searching the room. 

* * *

_ Genjustu _ is a shinobi-only club in one of the most popular districts of Konoha, occupied by a bustling nightlife that only dims near sunrise. The interior is dimly lit, music pounding from speakers and bodies swaying on the dancefloor. Sakura sits in a booth with her friends, laughing at some joke and celebrating Ino’s success in joining the Analysis Team.

Hinata nurses a non-alcoholic fruity drink, whilst Tenten knocks back one shot after the other, easily the one with the highest alcohol tolerance of their group. The girls, sans Hinata, all have flushed cheeks and bright eyes from their drinks. 

Instinctively, Shikamaru steps out of the way as Tenten manages to drag Hinata to the dancefloor. 

With just them alone now and with more drinks coursing through their systems, Ino and Sakura lean into one another, both of them sporting twin looks dejection as they stare into the bottom of their glasses like two women that confessed their love but were turned down. 

“I wish he were here,” Ino slurs, swirling whatever’s left of her pink drink. “Well, not here _ here _, he wouldn’t have liked it... But maybe earlier...” Her parents had treated their family friends and sensei for dinner in a restaurant in celebration. “The staff was specialized in mackerel...” 

Sakura hums lowly, places the glass on the table with languid movements. “He’s proud of you, Ino. I’m sure of it.”

“Still, I wish I could see him again.” she shrugs, sniffling, and runs her finger along her bottom lashes. “It’s a good thing we went for waterproof mascara tonight.” 

They share a laugh over that, one that lacks all traces of humor and dissipates into nothing shortly after. Enveloped in the smell of sweat and alcohol and the loud beat of the songs, the duo drifts off into their own thoughts and lets silence settle between them. It takes a long while before Sakura speaks again.

“I loved him, Ino.” 

Ino is quiet at first, then jerks away as if she’s been burned, instantly sobering up at the confession. Not prepared for suddenly losing her support, Sakura nearly falls head-first into Ino’s lap, grabbing onto the table for support to pull herself upright. 

Shikamaru himself feels like all the air has been stolen from his lungs, somehow.

“What was that?” Ino demands, and Sakura props her elbows on the flat surface to shove the heels of her palms into her eyes. “Forehead. What. Was. That?”

“I loved him.” She repeats between gritted teeth, annoyed and upset and still hurting like all of them. “Love him still. Gods, I never thought that working on researches with him could lead to this. It was then that I realized he’d matured so much from that lazy kid he used to be. It’s like I stood no chance against him.” 

Ino places a hand on her shoulder, leaning closer to her face. “Why didn’t you tell me?” 

“I knew you’d try to set us up.” Sakura smiles, her lips wobbly, still hiding her eyes. “I wanted to do it on my own. I thought I had _ time, _ but then you came back from the mission without him and I- I missed my chance.” Dropping her hands to the table, Sakura reveals her red rimmed eyes, eyelashes clumped together by tears. “I feel like he’s talking to me.” 

“What do you mean he’s talking to you?” Ino sounds frantic, and Shikamaru can’t blame her for it. 

“The shadows,” she whispers, and Ino leans closer to hear it over the sound of the music. “I see weird shadows everywhere. It must be heartache, or exhaustion, I don’t know. Am I going crazy, Ino?”

In lieu of replying, her friend wraps her up in a tight hug, which Sakura promptly returns. Feeling numbed, Shikamaru only turns away from the sight after a new song starts playing, no longer being able to hear what they’re saying to each other. Despite the fact that Sakura thinks she’s imagining things, warmth spreads through him, knowing his feelings are returned.

He has to come back.


	2. pay attention to the motion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *arrives four months late with a cup of ginger tea* long time no see
> 
> I do have a decent reason to have disappeared for so long. Basically, between writing this and rushing to write 7 prompts for a fandom week, I burnt myself out. I kept jotting down ideas, I just couldn't _write_. Absolutely awful, 0/10
> 
> A big thanks to everyone who's read, commented, and/or left some nice words! It really helped me try to push through the slump and get my shit together, which I managed to do so like.......... last week. It might not be perfect because I'm rusty, but I'm trying. The third part will be up soon. It will be shorter, but it will wrap everything up nicely.
> 
> I will, eventually, reply to each of you individually. I'm just so bad at it, it's kinda overwhelming cjahjka 
> 
> Bouncy, I'm glad you enjoyed the first part and I apologize for the long wait. I hope this will be to your liking!

Sakura starts taking breaks. No more double shifts, no more spending most of her free time submerged in her research. She and Ino reach the conclusion that the shadows are a product of exhaustion, of running herself thin in hopes of distracting herself from grief for as long as she can. 

So she stops, takes daily walks, meets up with the girls, spends more time working out in the training grounds. Sometimes she manages to assemble what is left of Team 7 in Konoha and drags them along. It’s good practice. 

Kakashi doesn’t have as much free time now, if any, but silently he understands her struggles and makes time for them. The Hokage office becomes one of her favored locations during these days and she holes herself up in there, lending a hand to him as she would do with Tsunade when she still wore the Hokage robes, taking the place that had been Shikamaru’s until his tragic death. 

Only Ino knows the true extension of her hurt. Ino - and maybe Inoichi, Shikaku, Choji and his dad, because Ino is still a gossip, after all,  _ and _ the six of them are working together to find a way to retrieve Shikamaru’s body. They’re perceptive. 

She thinks Kakashi might know too, having witnessed hours upon hours in which Sakura and Shikamaru split tasks in his office, but if he knows, he doesn’t say anything. 

But no matter the amount of time she spends out of the hospital or in the office, out on hikes in the surrounding forest with Kakashi’s borrowed ninken, the odd placement of shadows doesn’t cease. 

Even if she’s getting plenty of rest in the nights and practices meditation every morning, there is always a shadow that shouldn’t be there, twisted in some impossible way that no object around her could cast such mark on the ground. 

Eventually, as the days pass and the shadows don’t disappear, Sakura stops thinking it’s just a product of her mind, of her grief and her broken heart playing tricks on her, and tries to see it from another angle. What if it’s a sign? What if there’s something that can be done? 

Her mind whirls with possibilities, but she’s spinning too much out of control to focus on them for now.

* * *

All of her jumbled thoughts and theories are written in a notepad she carries with her everywhere. Training, grocery shopping, running errands for Kakashi... She can be anywhere; if a speculation pops up, she’ll drop everything to write it down. 

She hasn’t talked to Ino and the others about it yet, resolving to looking into it further before bringing it up and getting their hopes up for nothing. 

Right now, she sits on a high stool in the renovated Ichiraku ramen, by the counter like they used to do many times before. His business is as packed as ever, new employees running around and delivering food and taking orders, but Teuchi and his daughter Ayame are the only ones truly manning the cooking pots. 

A warm, callused hand grasps her shoulder, and Sakura jerks back to reality to look at the grinning face of Naruto. “Hey!” She surges up, jumping into his arms for a tight hug that lifts her feet off the floor. His bright, loud laughter resonates in her ear, and she clutches him a little tighter as her heart twists painfully. 

He puts her down, left arm still bandaged and concealed from view. “Long time no see, Sakura-chan!” There was a time long, long ago when she didn’t think it’d be possible to miss him and his sunny smiles. How wrong she’d been. “You seemed pretty concentrated.”

“Ah, yeah. I was- researches, you know.” She slides back onto the stool and puts the notepad out of view. Naruto greets Teuchi, all smiles and crinkled eyes, and beams when he is offered a bowl on the house. 

He turns back to her, skin tanned from walking around for so long. She thinks back to all the places they visited, as depicted in the letters he’s sent over the months, and as much as she misses having him here, she’s glad he’s getting to enjoy his life with his best friend. Being Hokage is his dream, but she can’t imagine him sitting behind a desk all day.

“Where’s Sasuke-kun?” Years pass, but the honorific never leaves. She tried once, but it felt too odd for everyone to hear. Well, he’s still an important figure in her life, she supposes. 

Naruto tends to the nape of his neck with a sheepish smile. “He can’t quite face you yet, y’know.” 

She nods. “Yeah, the ‘I tried to kill you’ thing.” Sakura sighs, playing with her pencil. “But he tried to kill you too.” 

“It’s Sasuke,” he shrugs, like it explains it all, and it does somehow. Sakura doesn’t hold it against him.

Propping her chin on her palm, she narrows her eyes at him, at the ever present smile that’s wider and the shine in his eyes that’s brighter than she’s ever seen. “Something happened?” 

He halts, stammering, a blush rising up to his cheeks. Naruto is so easy to read sometimes, and she laughs in delight at his obvious embarrassment, even if there’s tension coiling in his shoulders. 

“Aww, I knew this would happen,” she coos, pursing her lips and making kissy noises. 

Naruto levels her with a look, and his shoulder droops with a sigh that comes from deep within. “I- we didn’t know how to tell you. Because, y’know-”

“I get it.” She waves him off. Too many years pining for a boy who only changed his mind and his ways when she’d already moved on. And still she lost the only other man she’d ever liked, slipped through her fingers like sand and escaped her reach. Maybe she’s not made for it - love - even if she looks like the embodiment of all that’s romantic and sweet. 

He seems relieved, because she understand and it saves him from having to explain, but she will grill him later for details on what it is like to date Sasuke Uchiha, because she doubts it’s like all she’d daydreamed as a kid. 

Naruto’s smile slips off his face, though, replaced by a sadness that makes her heart kick out in worry. Her gut twists, and she knows what it is about before he’s even opened his mouth. “Kakashi-sensei told me about Shikamaru.” 

Her fingers curl around the napkin until her knuckles turn white. His blue eyes flicker to it. “It caught all of us by surprise.” 

“No one knows when they’ll die when they’re a shinobi,” he murmurs, eyes dim and full of pain from losing a friend. “Where did it happen again?” 

“In southeastern Kawa, left by a riverbank.” She repeats, the words having been memorized long ago. Naruto nods like he’s noticed it too. He likely has. 

In spite of the voices drifting around the establishment, silence settles over the two of them. Sakura still can’t meet his eyes, too focused on glaring at the pot of sizzling meat to stop the waterworks. Her breath seizes when Naruto rests his hand over hers, and her fingers finally release the crumpled paper napkin, joints aching. 

“Did something happen?” 

His tone is caring, concerned, and she blinks against the tears, pressing her lips together in a tight, thin line. It’s a look he knows well enough, and Naruto is one of her best friends, able to read her like an open book despite his oblivious, knuckleheaded moments. 

“Oh, Sakura-chan...” He stands up, wraps her up in his arms and tucks her face into his chest. She clings to him, to the familiar smell of sunshine and grass and summer days, and cries silently even as her heart is being squeezed to an inch of its life. Grief is a funny thing, she thinks, and it takes so long to ease, if ever. 

“It’s dangerous in Kawa, but if we end up going there, or if you do...” He trails off, fingers combing through her hair, and she nods with a whispered thanks. 

* * *

“If my neighbors hear me now, they’ll think I’m crazy. Maybe I am. Maybe I really am crazy.”

Or maybe not, she speaks too much to herself on a daily basis for her neighbors to think something is off about her behavior today. Furthermore, she has been acting far stranger these past weeks; grief is often something hard to overcome. 

She places two pieces of paper on the tabletop, a single word written in each, yes and no, across from the shadow cutting the surface at an odd angle. Her research materials are pushed to the side, on standby, waiting to be picked up again after long days of unuse. 

If this is what she thinks it is, though, it will certainly motivate her to resume it. 

The idea sneaked up on her when Naruto was in Konoha, when she’d been walking over to Ichiraku and watching the dancing shadows of the trees she walked past. What if the weird, misplaced shadows weren’t a product of her imagination, but were real and purposefully appeared in front of her eyes? It seems ludicrous to think that Shikamaru could be trying to talk to her, but  _ what if? _

In the end, if she really is wrong, she will have to deal with a new pang of heartache and possibly seek professional help.

“Alright.” Never before had talking to herself felt so weird. “Are you really here... Shikamaru?”

Sakura waits on bated breath, whether she would like to admit it or not, hands curled into tight fists in her lap. Her spine is tense and straight like a rod, and her heartbeat increases in anticipation. It feels like too long has passed, the silence of her apartment weighing down on her until she gets a response.

The shadow tentatively moves towards the  _ yes _ .

A rush of emotion overwhelms her, bringing tears to her eyes that are hard to hold back. A few of them spill down her cheeks, and she wipes at them weakly under the weight of her relief. Still, she pinches herself just in case.

Not a dream.

“Have you been here all along?”

_ Yes. _

Then, the one important question that might help them all: “Do you know where your body is?”

A pause, and then:  _ No. _

Her shoulders drop down further, that familiar feeling of despair trickling back in. She insistently pushes it back; this situation is better than previously anticipated. With Shikamaru’s soul and spirit here with them and not lost in the void, maybe he can aid in her research somehow.

Sakura wipes at her bottom lashes and breathes in deeply. “I’m sorry, I’m just so glad.” Smiling, she gazes directly across from her where she imagines him sitting with crossed legs, hands on his bent knees. “We will find your body and bring you back.” 

There are no appropriate answers that she provided him with, but the shadow lightly touching the  _ yes _ feels a lot like a  _ thank you _ .

* * *

She tells the others about Shikamaru. In a secluded room of the Nara Estate, Shikaku and Inoichi run tests to confirm it is indeed Shikamaru and not some... Malign spirit passing as him or something. The extensive variety of words on slip of papers allow him to craft elaborate answers and thus it is confirmed: Shikamaru’s soul is indeed in Konoha. 

It brings them all hope that there really is something that can be done, and Sakura dives into her research with renewed vigor whilst the others study maps and formulate strategies to find his body and retrieve it. Shikamaru aids them as best as he can given his current state and spends a lot of time with his family and teammates as the days pass.

But he always comes back to her house at night after a long day of work. Sakura goes as far as to pour a cup of tea that will never be touched in one of her mugs of solid color, and sometimes he wakes her up to go to bed when she falls asleep on the table surrounded by scrolls and notes.

Today, she sits on the ground of her living room to have dinner, the scroll of characters rolled open by her side. Each household has a copy for when Shikamaru comes around. 

“How long have you been here?” 

_ All along _ , the shadow says, slithering towards the corresponding characters. Nodding, she nibbles on a piece of vegetable when it hits her.

“Wait,” and here she almost chokes on the bitten off piece of carrot in her mouth. “How much did you hear? Or see?” 

_ I didn’t see anything _ , he replies immediately and, for a shadow, Shikamaru sounds serious about it. Not that Sakura could do anything if he did peep at her, not until they find his body. 

Then, the shadow quivers, as if it’s laughing at her somehow.  _ But I heard a lot _ .

She tries to think of every embarrassing thing she could have said in the past weeks, but all her mind can cling to is the memory of her opening her heart to Ino in  _ Genjutsu _ , declaring that she was in love with Shikamaru.

“Oh,” she pokes at her bowl of food, suddenly losing her appetite. He wasn’t supposed to know about that. “Well - I hope it brought you a sliver of joy at least.” 

_ It did _ , but he doesn’t say what it was and she doesn’t ask either.

* * *

With the knowledge that Shikamaru’s spirit is among them, Kakashi doubles his efforts in tracking down the body. He teams up with allied nations and, at his sister’s request, Gaara is the one who helps the most, lending teams to help in the search. 

Shikaku, Inoichi and Choza take turns in accompanying the teams into Kawa territory. The search also provides the Kages with the chance to find out the reason behind the uncharacteristic instability in such a small country. Last she’d been there, Kawa was a peaceful place, though Sakura is beginning to think it’s been cursed. It was there that Shukaku was extracted out of Gaara, where Chiyo lost her life, and now where Shikamaru lost his life as well. 

Ino and Choji remain in Konoha regardless of where their parents are, Ino in the Investigation Team and Choji doing his best to aid Sakura with her own research. Kakashi granted them access to secret scrolls kept within the Hokage Tower after she’d gone through most of the public library archive and the ones in the hospital. This might as well be her last hope. 

Choji’s a great help, even if he doesn’t understand most of the medical texts piling on the table. An extra pair of hands and eyes is always great for separating the few scrolls that can be studied further in her home from the large numbers of texts that won’t help at all. 

Today, Sakura is alone. Well, Shikamaru is with her, but he doesn’t interact with her much when she’s researching. He’s eager (for once!) to return to his body and knows better than to disrupt her concentration. Locked in a room adjacent to the Hokage’s office, Sakura pours over one of the few scrolls that might hold an answer when the door opens. 

She lifts her head, too aware of the crick in her neck and the pain behind her eye from long hours of studying, and blinks at the person standing in the doorway. “Shishou!” 

Tsunade stands there like the answer to all of her prayers, a manicured hand on her hip and lips tugged into one of the softest smiles Sakura has seen. Her eyes are soft too, bright like warm honey. “Sakura,” she greets, closing the door behind her back and sealing them inside with only the yellow light bulb as company. “Kakashi told me everything.” 

Sakura wants to run over and hug her, thank her for being here and then thank Kakashi for reaching out to Tsunade, but her mentor has never been one for open displays of affection. Tsunade is the definition of tough love, and it’s already a feat that she looks so compassionate now.

Pulling a chair back, Tsunade sits across from Sakura and picks one of the scrolls up. “What do we know about the biological aspects of his death so far?”

“Not much,” Sakura admits, the defeated tone of her voice an old friend. “They were ambushed and Shikamaru was gravely injured along the fourth and sixth ribs, according to Ino. She tried to heal him, but it was no use. He was already on the brink of death and they couldn’t save him  _ and _ fight for their lives. They had to leave his body behind to escape.” 

Tsunade hums in contemplation, eyes skimming the text in her hands. “Truly, I have never heard of something like this.” 

Sakura lowers her head with a sound of agreement. She hates that there isn’t any material to learn from, no one that has written about anything that comes close to  _ this _ . Above all else, she hates her own inability to come up with a solution. 

Has she really surpassed Tsunade if she can’t solve this?

“Sakura.” Startling, she looks up at her old mentor, at the rigid yet reassuring lines of her face. Sakura must have been sulking if Tsunade is looking at her like that. “We’ll figure it out.” 

Gods, she hopes so.

There’s a beat of silence before Tsunade lowers the scroll and glances around the room. “Is he really here now?” 

The lone light bulb permits the creation of longer shadows. Sakura motions to the open scroll of characters on the table in time to see a tendril of shadow stretching from towards the shelves in the back of the room, its sharp point connecting to  _ Yes _ .

“Well, Shikamaru,” Tsunade drawls, picking the scroll back up, gazing at where he should be standing. “Put that brilliant brain of yours to work, as well.” 

* * *

Training grounds five is reserved for a sparring match between Sakura and her invisible partner. Training with Shikamaru keeps her senses sharp, and improves her reflexes, dodging unseen attacks from left and right. 

She blows holes in the ground with her punches, backflips out of the way a few times, hurls boulders to create distractions, and she might have broken a tree or two. The banter is one-sided, her voice the only sound aside from destruction in this area, but she likes to picture him sitting under the shade of a tree, hands positioned in a seal and a smirk on his lips. 

The image is so real behind her eyelids that her heart skips a beat and her foot slips on the cracked chunks of soil she’d caused, and it’s only his shadow that keeps her upright so she won’t roll down to the bottom of the hole. Righting herself, she declares it’s time for a break. 

Training had been the only way that had successfully kept issues out of her head, but these days it’s hard to not think about Shikamaru’s soul and his lost body and a way to reconnect the two. Tsunade has been of great help, Shizune has joined the fray, and Choji continues to help them from time to time. Sometimes, he’s allowed into the Investigation Team meetings, as she is, though her busy schedule as medic doesn’t allow her to attend to all of them. 

With heavy limbs, she sits down under the tree where Shikamaru had been all along, her backpack pushed up against the thick roots. Half a bottle of water later, she rolls open the scroll for a conversation that is sure to circle back to the matter at hand. 

It doesn’t take long until they’re talking about the solution. It’s all everyone involved has been talking about. 

“Ugh, I hate this.” Sakura presses the heels of her palms to her eyes, the worn out leather of her gloves skin-warm. It does little to fend off the headache blooming from gritting her teeth so hard. 

_ It’s okay _ , he says and hesitates. Shikamaru has never been a good liar, never has been prone to lying in the first place, but she knows he was aiming to reassure her in some way should she fail to restore his soul back into his body, to say words like  _ don’t worry, I’ll be fine _ . It’s good he didn’t add more. She’d find a way to punch his spirit and make him feel it if he continued. 

She chooses to play dumb and pretend she doesn’t know where this was going, and nods before taking another sip of water. “I’ve been thinking these days... Naruto always found a way to work things out.” 

_ Are you saying _ , he begins,  _ that we should call him back to help? _

“No, that wouldn’t be very effective.” Naruto is smart when he wants to be, very much so, but this isn’t his area of expertise. “It’s more like... Maybe I should think like him. What would Naruto do?”

_ Improvise _ , he answers immediately, and she snorts imagining his usual dry tone. When has Naruto ever followed a plan through? He could never be part of the ANBU.

Sakura swirls the last of the water inside the bottle, watches the liquid spiral around the plastic, until a sliver of shadow in her line of sight catches her attention. Turning to the scroll, Shikamaru says,  _ He would think outside the box.  _

That could work. Most of his actions are decided in the last minute based on his surroundings and are, ninety percent of the time, unconventional. Though most of his surprise attacks involve shadow clones and the Rasengan, he always finds new, unusual ways to surprise his foes. Of course she can’t just try to improvise once in kawa territory, but still.

“Think outside the box,” she muses to herself, feeling like they might get somewhere now.

* * *

A few days later, when she meets up with Shizune and Tsunade to research, Sakura drags Kakashi into the small room as well and locks the door behind her back. The click of the lock makes Tsunade lift an eyebrow, makes Shizune give the Hokage a questioning look, to which he shrugs in response. Sakura gets him to sit on a vacant chair, trying to conceal the shaking of her hands. Shikamaru isn’t here today and that’s for the best.

She breathes in deeply and slowly lets it out.

_ Think outside the box. _

“Living Corpse Reincarnation.” The idea came to her out of the blue when she’d been so deep in thought that she burned a fried egg to a crisp. She might have had a little bit of an issue to scrub the frying pan clean later, but at least she’d found a possible solution to her problem. 

Kakashi recomposes himself fairly quick from his shock whilst Shizune is still looking at her like she’s just proposed sacrificing an infant. In comparison, Tsunade’s previously wide eyes narrow down to slits. “Sakura-” 

“Hear me out,” she cuts in, aware that Tsunade will take offense in that, but she has to defend her theory. “I’m not saying to do it like  _ that _ . I’m saying - maybe we can look into it, find a way to change it, manipulate it and make it less evil. His research is still here, right? There has to be a copy somewhere.” 

“We know how this is affecting you personally,” Kakashi’s placating tone is, for once, not sitting well with her. “But this is too much.” 

“We can find another way,” Shizune tries to reassure, her smile tremulous and uncertain.

“What other way?” She’s tired, tired of reading and researching and getting nowhere, tired of having Shikamaru live another day as a ghost, tired of having him so close but still out of reach. She’s so tired. “We’ve read every scroll and text in this room at least twice! I’ve been researching for weeks and nothing has been found!”

Tsunade’s pink lips pull back to reveal gritted teeth. “You’re asking us to meddle with a despicable jutsu.” 

“I’m asking to use it as guidelines to save someone’s  _ life _ !” The backrest of a chair cracks under the strength of her grip. She will fight tooth and nail for this. “If Orochimaru can transfer his mind to a different body, there has to be a way to put a soul back into its righteous body.” 

“I am  _ not _ doing that!” Tsunade barks, but Sakura isn’t afraid of her display of teeth, and she can bark louder. 

“Fine, I can do it myself!” 

She can find a way. She can work around the original research and create something better, something that will be put to good use. Sakura saved Kankuro before and separated poison from his blood, saved countless lives during the Fourth Great Ninja War. This will be hard and will take time, but she can do it. She knows she can.

The door bangs against the wall as she throws it open and leaves the room in a flurry of red and pink, walking out of the Hokage Tower as fast as her feet can take her. They’ve been stumped from weeks,  _ months, _ and when a possible solution presents itself to her, they refuse to listen. It’s not despicable and immoral if it’s used for the right thing. She’s trying to  _ save _ Shikamaru. 

One of the training grounds has to be disoccupied at this hour. She slips into the second one and works out her rage, wreaking havoc inside the fenced area until all the tension in her muscles seep out of her and the scream that’s been lodged in her throat since she stormed out can be swallowed back down. 

By the time she’s done, the training grounds is almost unrecognizable, trees bent and rocks overturned, earth cracked from the force of stomps and punches. Sakura is positively exhausted when she flops down under one of the last remaining standing trees, chest heaving to get air into her lungs. 

It doesn’t take long for her to be approached by no one other than Kakashi, who lowers himself down to a crouch by her side. She feels like she’s fresh out of academy, even if he’s in Hokage robes and all. 

“I knew I’d find you here.” His eyes are crinkled in a hidden smile, and she huffs out the laugh she can’t quite hold back. He observes the training ground next. “You really did a number on it this time.” 

She hums noncommittally, then fixes him with a stare that is her polite way of demanding _ “what do you want?” _

He sighs as if disappointed that she isn’t indulging him in some bantering. If Sakura is tired from all the punching, Kakashi looks exhausted from the following talk with Tsunade, like he hasn’t slept in so long and the robes weigh a ton. She kinda feels guilty for adding more to his plate, but it was necessary.

“I came here to talk about the meeting.” Sakura stays in silence and maintains a neutral expression, waiting for him to elaborate. He holds her gaze, all traces of humor gone, then sighs again, drooping his shoulders further. “Ah, you’ve always known exactly how to get what you want since you were a little genin fresh out of academy.”

“I didn’t storm out for that reason.” She’d been rightfully angry and pissed off. None of that was for show, and he knows it.

“Either way, you won the case.” He pats her shoulder lightly. “We had a long talk and decided to give it a shot, with a few conditions.”

“And they are?”

Kakashi lifts up his hand to list off the conditions. “One, the research is to be burned afterwards. Two, no one outside the four of us can ever hear about it. Three, you will have to be alone when performing it.” 

Sakura nods, all fair conditions and terms. She’d been expecting no less when she entertained the idea of bringing it up. “All right.” 

He lowers his hand and gives her a smile. “How did you reach that conclusion?”

“I channeled my inner Naruto.”  _ Think outside the box _ . She will try that more often and see where it will take her.

“That is not the answer I was expecting, but I’ll take it.” Kakashi reaches out to ruffle her damp locks, reminiscent of the way he used to do so after training, or how he patted her head after the Forest of Death when she’d decided to really commit to being a ninja. “Well done. I am so proud of you.” 

Her bottom lashes might be a little damp, but they’re both going to pretend it’s just sweat. “Thank you, sensei.” 

* * *

In the Intelligence Division building, Sakura half-walks, half-jogs towards the secluded room in the depths of the place. She’d called for a last minute meeting, Kakashi’s borrowed ninken delivering the messages in a matter of minutes. Pakkun runs close to her feet, navigating her through the hallways thanks to his sense of smell. 

Technically, she shouldn’t be allowed inside, but this is a very, very important matter. 

Her heart beats fast from her pace, but mostly its wild rhythm is thanks to finally,  _ finally _ feeling successful after long months of hard work and grief. She can’t stop grinning, can’t stop the sheen of happy tears that cloud her eyes every few minutes or so, can’t stop looking to her side because she knows Shikamaru is  _ here _ and, right now, he’s as elated as she is.

“Forehead!” Ino is upon her as soon as she closes the heavy door, the room littered with maps, pages and extraction plans to retrieve his body. Her hands grasp Sakura’s shoulders, fingers digging into the clothed skin. “Tell us you have good news!”

She looks at her best friend, her blue eyes trembling with unshed tears of hope, then lets her gaze wander around to look at the others. Choji and his dad, Inoichi, Shikamaru’s parents, Asuma, Kurenai and her team who offered to help, Kakashi, Tsunade and Shizune.

Sakura breaks into a large grin and grabs Ino’s shoulders just as tight. “I did it!” 

The silence is broken by a relieved sob that comes from Yoshino, her hands coming up to cover her face and hide her tears. She hasn’t been the same since Team Asuma returned without her son. Gone was the fierceness, strength and all qualities that made Shikamaru call her a troublesome woman, all the things that made him fear provoking her, everything that made her  _ Yoshino _ . In their place settled a dullness that was unlike her, no light in her eyes and a downward slope to her shoulders that made her seem frail and helpless.

Shikaku folds her into an embrace and hides his face into her hair. The rest turns away from them to give the Nara a semblance of privacy, and express their relief in their own ways. Sakura sees Ino’s lips quiver a split second before she’s hugged tightly in a bone-crushing hug, her friend’s tears dampening the sleeve of her shirt. 

“I hate to ruin the mood,” Tsunade says after a while, once the flow of tears has diminished significantly. “But we won’t know if Sakura’s solution will truly work until she tries it.”

“Yes,” Sakura agrees, wiping her face with her hands. “The research is... Classified, and there have never been cases like this before, so I’m unable to test it.”

Inoichi places a heavy hand on her shoulder. “You did all you could, which is nothing short of best. Besides, it’s worth a shot.” He glances to a big map taped to the wall. “At the very least, we will retrieve his body.” 

“Right.” Shikaku smooths down his wife’s hair before stepping away slowly. “Now that Sakura’s found the solution, we can go over our best plan of action and prepare to depart.” 

Kakashi pushes himself away from where he’d been slouching against the wall to analyze the map closely. “You’ll need reinforcements.” 

Sakura meets his meaningful gaze and nods. “Call them.”

* * *

A week later, at the break of dawn, Sakura walks to the eastern gates of Konoha to meet up with the team. A pair is already waiting up ahead, and once she gets close enough, she notices it’s Shikaku and Yoshino. 

Yoshino looks much better now compared to how she had been just a few days ago. The shadows under her eyes are much lighter, her spine straighter, her clothes unwrinkled and unblemished. The stern expression is back, though lingering worry softens the edges and hard lines. 

“Sakura.” Yoshino calls before Sakura can as much as greet them good morning. “Thank you for doing this for us. For him.” 

Sakura stammers for a few beats, trying to find her voice. Yoshino’s earnestness caught her out of guard, as did her expression full of gratitude. “No need to thank me, Yoshino-san. It’s the least I can do for a friend.” 

Shikaku’s snort is cut short by a well aimed elbow to the ribs, which leaves him choking as Yoshino levels him with a glare. Stunned to silence, Sakura smiles nervously as Yoshino turns her attention back to her. “Yes, well - Shikamaru is very grateful for what you’re doing. Very, very grateful. Trust me.” 

Yoshino parts her lips to speak more, but stops to glare down at her feet. “Shikamaru, stop that right now.” 

Looking down, Sakura sees a long strip of shadow connecting to the shadow cast by Yoshino on the ground. This time, Shikaku laughs without being interrupted. “Looks like he wants you to stop talking.” 

Yoshino hisses something Sakura can’t quite catch, and brushes it aside once she hears the sounds of more steps approaching the gates. The rest of the group has arrived, determined looks on their faces despite the early hour.

“Don’t worry, Yoshino.” Choza reassures her as the rest files out of the gates. “We’ll bring him back.” 

Shikaku and Asuma lead the group down the path towards Kawa. The time has finally come.

* * *

Southeastern Kawa quickly becomes a messy battlefield, not in the same scale as a Great Ninja War, but a bloody, gory mess nonetheless.

There are a lot more ninjas than should be expected for such a small country, but their group is large enough to deal with them without too much trouble. A few of these faces are familiar to her from past missions, hospital work, or the war itself, meanwhile others are fresh, new to this kind of thing, but mostly new to the sight of the duo leading the charge against them.

Naruto and Sasuke joined their team halfway through their trip. She had known Naruto would not turn down her request for help, as Shikamaru had been a dear friend of his and, also, he’d promised. He never fails to keep a promise.

And Sasuke, well, he feels like he owes her something for all he’s done, so this a good form of repayment, she thinks. 

Temari and Kankuro lead the charge from Suna, trapping the Kawa shinobi between two troops in an effective siege. The strike as a whole in unexpected, catching them unprepared and by surprise.

Sakura herself isn’t allowed to fight today. Orochimaru’s jutsu, Living Corpse Reincarnation, could take hours to be completed, so who is to know how long her modificated jutsu might take, or how much chakra it will consume? All she has are speculations, guesses, no concrete answer to that, so it is best to conserve energy and chakra, Byakugo seal or not. 

Although the way she has to rely on others for protection is so very reminiscent of her early genin days that it makes her skin crawl.

A few of Naruto’s shadow clones join the group surrounding her, led by Asuma himself as he, what’s left of his team, Shikaku and Kiba make their way to the largest river that cuts through this area, the place where they’d had, according to their extensive searching, left Shikamaru behind. 

Sakura doesn’t remember seeing Ino and Choji so vicious as they cut down Kawa shinobi one after the other, but their anger, resentment and pain are justified. 

It takes a lot of time until they make it to the riverbank, and from there Naruto’s clones engage their enemies as the rest of the group splits up to frantically look around for his body. No overgrown bush is left untouched, and every spot of turned earth is checked just in case the body it’s down under. Her heart picks its pace up every time nothing is found, running wild on a desperation to find him and take him back home. 

“I found him!” Kiba’s voice rings out among the commotion, accompanied by a sharp bark from Akamaru.

Immediately, the scattered group runs his location. Kiba is crouched low and breaking apart branches from a bush as his dogs bites at them with sharp teeth. One of Shikamaru’s shirt they’d brought along is slung over Kiba’s shoulder, the lingering scent on the fabric was used to help Akamaru track him down. 

Shikaku lifts up his son’s body as Shikamaru’s teammates close in on them with worried eyes and hands. They part to let Sakura closer and she runs a quick diagnosis with a glowing palm, taking in the paleness of his skin, the thin veins underneath, and the blue shade of his lips. Despite the months that passed, his body is still whole, intact, almost as if he’s been lying stagnant all along, unaffected by time and weather.

Retracting her hand, Sakura nods resolutely. “Let’s go.” 

The fight doesn’t seem to be going as strong anymore, but still the group splits again as some return to the fray and flee the area, headed for a safer location for the procedure. 

Sakura and Team Asuma make it past the border into Fire territory, towards one of the nearby villages. She is given Shikamaru’s body and wanders inside one of the inns alone, towards the room she’d rented earlier and prepared for the jutsu. The array lies untouched on the ground, and she carefully steps over the lines made of chalk to place his body at the center. 

Unrolling the usual scroll of words and characters, she smiles at Shikamaru’s still form and asks the spirit close by. “Ready?”

_ Yes. _

She makes a series of hand signs, Byakugo unfurling and releasing the chakra stored at the center of her forehead, power rushing through her body, and places her palms down on the floorboards. 


	3. i'm so alive

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “So it’s finally over. This is the end.”   
“No. It’s another beginning.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, I'm not 100% satisfied with this, but I fear it would take me another 3 months to polish it to my likings. Or maybe that's the lingering writer's block speaking.
> 
> Either way, enjoy!

Early morning sunlight filters into the hospital room. The air smells sweet from the various flower arrangements occupying almost every flat surface, their bright colors making the whiteness of the room seem less sterile. Balloons are tied to the post at the foot of the bed, and get well cards are stacked neatly on the bedside table. 

Sakura sits on a chair by the bedside, flipping through results of the many exams they’d done these last forty-eight hours. For the first time in so long, she feels relaxed to the point of humming a tune under her breath as her eyes follow along numbers and descriptions.

The steady breathing of the body on the bed is reassuring. 

It will always stick with her, the memory of Shikamaru surging up with a gasp just as her chakra reserves were nearly depleted, coughs hacking through his body,  _ alive _ . The jutsu had taken its toll on her, but she still had enough strength to move over and check on him, be the first one he saw again in his second chance at life. He didn’t stay awake for long, and she placed him on the bed and wiped down the array before calling up the rest of his team. 

Shuffling noises coming from the bed makes her put away the results and turn around expectantly. Shikamaru’s fingers flex on the sheets as his eyelids tremble, slowly parting to reveal his eyes. He’s weakened and will need lots of physical therapy and rest, but the complications aren’t too worrying, thankfully. 

He turns his head to face her, squinting against the sunlight coming from behind her. Sakura smiles softly. “Hey. You’ve been asleep for a long time.”

She wants to reach over and hold his hand, hold  _ him _ , say all the things she’s wanted to say for a long time, things he probably already knows from his time as a ghost. 

But she doesn’t know if he remembers any of what he witnessed as a wandering spirit, so she stays put for now.

He’s quiet for a while, and she takes the time to pour him a glass of water. “Sakura?” Shikamaru glances behind her again, at the bright stream of light pouring in, and frowns when his gaze returns to her face. “Where-? Did it go wrong? Did you die, too?” 

Stunned, she takes her time to digest his words... Then she’s laughing, happy tears spilling from her eyes, flowing freely as he scowls at her, like he doesn’t think she should be laughing for having died. 

It’s all the confirmation she needs.

“What’s so funny?” He bites, so snappy for someone who had been  _ dead _ just a few days ago, and it’s so, so reassuring. 

Nearly doubling over from the laughter bubbling up, she sits on the edge of the bed, allowing herself to cover his hand with her own. “I thought you were smarter than this, Shikamaru.” Sakura laces their fingers together, because why not? “Do I look that angelic to you?”

Once again he looks at the window, then at her, and realization dawns on his face. It’s a brief spark of relief and happiness before his expression twists into annoyance and he sinks back into the pillows with a groan. “Give me a break. I was dead until recently.” She snickers quietly, and his lips quirk like he’s trying to fight a smile. 

“You were.” All the medication must be messing with his brain too, but she doesn’t say that. “Try to not let it happen again.” 

“I have no intentions of repeating the experience.” His thumb caresses her knuckles, the skin roughened from wielding weapons and fighting. “I seriously thought for a second that you’d died trying to save me.” 

“I wouldn’t let that happen,” she declares, resolution visible in the tenderness of her voice. 

With her fingers, Sakura brushes his loose hair, clean from a shower she and Yoshino had given him not too long ago. Shikamaru sighs pleasantly, his body relaxing again as his head seems to sink further into the pillows, lips quirking at the corners in a content smile. She wants to kiss him. 

“Sleep,” she says, noticing how his eyes are fighting the wave of drowsiness induced by the medication. “I’ll be here when you wake up.” 

He nods with a faint hum of affirmation, pressing his face into the touch of her hand. Sakura places a kiss on his forehead.

* * *

“You absolute idiot!” Ino’s voice rings from within the hospital room, too loud. “If you ever complain about something being troublesome again, I’m going to snap your neck!” 

All the years of being that pig’s best friend allow Sakura to detect traces of incoming waterworks. 

Sakura stays in the hallway, where she’d been for the past half hour or so as Yoshino and Shikaku properly reunited with their son. There is much to be said about Shikamaru’s condition, recovery process and estimated time for getting a clearance to leave, but she knew how much they’d missed him, and knew that they wouldn’t give her their undivided attention with Shikamaru so close by, so she had them go inside before saying anything. 

Not too long after, Asuma, his students and their parents arrived. Ino, too impatient, invited herself into the room and dragged the others with them. With their arrival, it won’t be too long until Yoshino and Shikaku come out to talk to her.

Sakura rubs a finger on the center of her forehead, where the shape of the Byakugo seal rests. Her chakra levels aren’t stable enough as of yet, but her body keeps on redirecting chakra in that particular point for storage despite Tsunade’s warnings to rest and wait a little longer. I’s the first time she’s neared the edge of chakra exhaustion, and she still feels drained of energy. For the past day, Sakura may or may not be running on three cups of coffee and energy bars kept around for long medical procedures. 

She needs to stay by his side and ensure he’s fine and that there will be no rebounds from the jutsu, even if Tsunade threatens to strap her to a bed and force her to sleep. With a fist. 

The door opens and Shikamaru’s parents step out. Sakura rises from the chair she’d been occupying to greet them, her words dying in her throat as Yoshino pulls her into a tight hug. She blinks stupidly, meets with Shikaku’s bright and fond gaze and smiles herself, placing her hand on Yoshino’s back. 

“Thank you,” Yoshino sighs wetly, Sakura’s shirt absorbing her tears. “Thank you so much.” 

“If we can repay you, somehow…” Shikaku trails off. 

Sakura shakes her head and steps back from the embrace to squeeze Yoshino’s shoulders gently. “Don’t worry about it. As I said, it’s the least I can do for a friend.” And indeed, that might have been her most selfless act. 

Sakura had been grieving a lost friend and crush, but others were grieving a childhood friend, a teammate, a son, a student. She promised herself to do her best just so she wouldn’t have to see Ino look so sad and hellbent on saving his body, so Yoshino wouldn’t look like a shadow of her former self, so Choji could feel comfortable again in his favorite barbecue restaurant. 

So Shikamaru could live his normal, just-right life and die of old age before the regular woman he married and called wife, even if that wasn’t her. 

Yoshino wipes her eyes with a handkerchief provided by her husband and squares her shoulders as she rebuilds her fierce walls. “Then please, come have dinner with us once he’s allowed to go back home.” Yoshino nods to herself, eyes shining with determination. “Shikamaru would like that.” 

“Thank you for the invitation.” Sakura folds her hands and bows in gratitude. 

“Hey, none of that now.” Shikaku huffs, his smile genuine for the first time in so long. “If anyone here is to bow, it’s us. Hell, we’d need to prostrate.”

“T-There’s no need for that!” She waves her hands in front of her body, embarrassed at the idea that they’d ever do that. 

But Shikaku chuckles and Yoshino smirks, and Sakura laughs as well despite the blush on her cheeks. 

* * *

Tsunade and Shizune pour chakra into his body, something about helping his muscles recover from long months of disuse so the physiotherapy sessions would be more effective. When asked why Sakura isn’t the one doing it, Tsunade had just grumbled something about her being grounded and forbidden from using her chakra for a month. 

By the looks of it, the two women and Kakashi shared the sentiment that Sakura shouldn’t even be here in the hospital. Or rather, that she should be in a hospital bed herself. 

Sakura kept quiet out of respect for her three seniors, but dramatically rolled her eyes behind their backs. 

It took one single look from Tsunade for him to know to never ask about the jutsu used to tie his soul back to his body. He recalls the secrecy of it all, how Sakura would never take the research home and even forbid him from visiting the Hokage Tower as a ghost. And he’d complied with her request -  _ order _ \- as he understood it could be potentially dangerous if the information got out. 

By now he’s aware the research is long gone. The only people who might know the full extent behind the array and its workings are mentor and pupil, if not just Sakura alone, and he knows she will take this to the grave. It’s a good thing the Yamanaka are on their side, so no one can enter her mind and just steal it.

He admits he is curious, though..

His legs tingle, warmth spreading as Tsunade and Shizune continue to work. Kakashi is sitting facing the window, deftly peeling an orange that had come with Shikamaru’s breakfast that he didn’t bother to eat. The curtains are closed. 

“Things are much worse in Kawa than we’d ever expected,” Kakashi muses, pausing to savor a piece of orange. “If it weren’t for your team passing through that particular area, Shikamaru, we probably would never find out about all the issues until it was too late.”

Tsunade makes a noise and moves higher up Shikamaru’s legs. He’s sure she’s annoyed for being dragged into another political turmoil when she’s retired. He asks, “And these are?” 

“Ah, you worry about recovering for now. You and Sakura.” Kakashi waves a hand in the air, dismissive. “Konoha and Suna have joined forces to investigate it further. We fear the network has spread to other small countries. You’ll both be part of it soon enough, so concentrate on getting better for the time being.” 

Shikamaru looks at Sakura, who’s been leaning on the wall on the opposite side of the room all along. “No use looking at her,” Tsunade drawls, her sharp honey eyes flicking between the two of them. “She already got her way once. We aren’t telling her anything no matter how many times she throws a tantrum and storms out of a room.” 

Sakura shrugs, not looking guilty in the slightest. “Well worth it.” She gestures at Shikamaru, and he feels another spark of curiosity, but quickly stomps it back down.

“Yes,” Shizune agrees, stopping her ministrations to sweep her hair up in a low ponytail. “It really was worth it in the end.” 

“Don’t make a habit of it,” Tsunade warns, brows furrowed in concentration. “Next time I may not be so merciful and not even Kakashi and his soft spot for his students will stop me.”

Kakashi makes a dismayed noise from around the slice of orange in his mouth. Sakura grins at the mop of silver hair. “Got it, shishou.” 

* * *

The last time he’d been to the physiotherapy wing of the hospital was when Pain destroyed Konoha with a single strike some years ago. Shikamaru doesn’t remember the pain from the broken leg itself, but he remembers how it was unbearable and that each physiotherapy session seemed endless.

He’s allowed to rest for some minutes, a chance to catch his breath, drink some water and have a snack. His body feels too weak, almost frail, and though the restoration of muscle tissue with chakra certainly helps, it’s not a magical solution. He still needs to do this the traditional way and relearn how to walk, strengthen his muscles with simple exercises and such.

Sakura is with him, of course. Though she still remains tight-lipped about the jutsu used, she did reveal that it consumed nearly all of her chakra reserves. As of now, she has about the same quantity of chakra in her body as she did during academy days, and it will take some time to replenish it.

While he does feel guilty for being responsible for it, his happiness for being alive once again outweighs any negative thought. 

She’s writing down the results of this session so far when the door opens and Naruto wanders inside with a loud greeting, dressed in yet another black and orange jumpsuit. Some things just never change. 

Most surprisingly, though, is that Sasuke is right behind him.

“Hey, Naruto!” Sakura lowers her clipboard and focuses her sharp gaze on him. “Where have you been?” 

He grins widely. “Ah, Sakura-chan! Right after we came back from Kawa and reported to Kakashi-sensei, he had us go back there to investigate why there were so many-” 

Naruto sputters as a slap delivered to the back of his head makes him bite his tongue mid speech. Cradling his face, he throws a dirty look at Sasuke, but the man is too busy leveling Sakura with a dead stare as she narrows her eyes at him. “You can’t say anything to her, remember?”

“Thanks a lot, Sasuke-kun.” She huffs, tossing her short hair over her shoulder. 

Naruto is still nursing the sore spot on his head when he grumbles something about  _ bad friends _ and  _ Shikamaru would never _ . “Anyway, how are you, Shikamaru? Sorry we couldn’t visit sooner.” 

“I’m alright.” He gets to nap and watch clouds from his bed, he’s given several portions of food a day to help him return to a healthy weight, and Asuma comes daily to play shogi and go. A few months ago, he wouldn’t have complained about this predicament.

_ You better stop being such a lazy ass, _ Ino’s voice echoes in his head, shortly followed by his dad’s _ it’s your second chance, son, don’t waste it _ .

Yeah, he didn’t deplete Sakura’s reserves of chakra just so she could revive someone who found everything troublesome and would rather sleep than be productive unless required. He actually feels like going out and doing something, anything. Training, hiking, you name it. “Just counting down the days until I get to leave,” he amends. 

“I see, I see.” Naruto nods fervently. “No one likes being here. I don’t know how Sakura-chan stands working in a hospital.” He turns to Sasuke before Sakura can hurl the clipboard at his head. “Say, remember the last time you were in a hospital? We fought on the roof!” 

“The last time was after the war, Naruto,” Sakura corrects as Sasuke says, at the same time, “We nearly killed her, idiot.” 

“Sasuke, you bas- oh. Right.” Awkward, Naruto clears his throat and looks around the room as if hoping to find a new topic to talk about.

Shikamaru had forgotten how  _ chaotic _ Team 7 and Team Kakashi are. They’re all people with something peculiar or strange about their pasts. Between the host of a tailed beast, an atonned deserter, a teacher with his own set of issues, an ex-ANBU with zero social skills, and the fruit of one of Orochimaru’s experiments, Sakura, with her inhuman strength and legendary short temper inherited from her mentor, is the one who comes close to being normal. 

How many times have they tried to kill each other?

“That reminds me,” she taps her pen on the clipboard. “Sasuke did slap my plate of apple slices right out of my hands before that.” Sakura motions to the space to left of Shikamaru’s seat, where an empty plate rests on top of a stool. “Shikamaru ate the slices without complaint. See?” 

He feels like a little kid, like he’s in the academy and he’s being used as an example to be followed, which never really happened since he never tried to excel in anything, but if her intentions were to bother Sasuke - it works, surprisingly. Sasuke glares at the wall so hard, Shikamaru fears it will burst up in a rush of black flames.

If Shikamaru can guess the reason why Sasuke reacted like that, it probably is because he regrets what he did so long ago. 

“Sasuke doesn’t know how to appreciate nice gestures, Sakura-chan.” 

It’s obvious that Naruto is trying to rile Sasuke up, and the last thing Shikamaru needs is to witness a second round of a hospital roof fight, because he knows Sakura will destroy the water towers herself and punch them into next week as a bonus. 

But Sasuke doesn’t rise up to take the bait and settles for saying, instead, “ _ He _ better appreciate it.” The person in question is Shikamaru, all his suspicions confirmed when Sasuke’s dark eye falls on him. 

And here’s the thing, Shikamaru likes her, and she likes him, as evident in every touch that lingers for much longer than it should, but they never actually addressed it. And to have Sasuke, of all people, pointing it out is really embarrassing. 

Shikamaru doesn’t know how to go about it. He’s promised himself he will talk to her once he’s cleared to leave the hospital, because, as of now, he’s her patient, and it gives him some time to think of a way to invite her out that’s actually in character for him. Ino keeps suggesting the most absurd things, like barging into the hospital with a heap of flowers in one arm, a teddy bear in the other, and heart-shaped balloons floating overhead. 

He knows he’s willing to change and live differently, but that’s  _ too much. _

But, from what Ino said once with all the eagerness of a gossiper with fresh content in her hands, it seems Naruto and Sasuke are  _ actually dating.  _ If these two polar opposite morons found a common ground, then Sakura, a mostly normal person, and Shikamaru, who used to be normal until his spirit was separated from his body, can find a common ground too. 

Chouji still is the best person to ask for advice, though. 

“Right!” Naruto agrees, and Sakura has her face hidden in her hands, though her twitching fingers indicate she’s reaching her limits. “You better appreciate her, Shikamaru, or we’re going to kick your ass!”

Shikamaru can only hope the rest of her dysfunctional team and former mentor, the first bearer os inhuman strength and a legendary short temper, won’t decide to give him the talk as well. 

Naruto dodges the clipboard tossed his way, but the pen hits him square on the forehead. 

* * *

Dinner is held on the first weekend when he’s back home. Though his mother bothers him daily about his awkward dating-not-dating relationship status with Sakura and his dad teases him about it just as much, they don’t actually touch the topic when she’s around, saving him from another early death. 

She seemed ready to combust standing on their doorstep dressed in a simple blue dress with a box of sweets in her hands for dessert, nervously fidgeting in place wherever she was, be it standing in their living room or sitting down around the dinner table. 

Shikamaru had been ready to combust for another reason entirely. 

He offers to walk her back home under the guise of being chivalrous, but he just wants to spend more time with her. In his last days in the hospital, Sakura had replenished enough chakra to return to her usual work schedule and they didn’t get to see each other as often. That affected him more than he thought it would.

“Hey.” They’re stopped right outside her apartment building when she offers, “How about you drink tea for a change?” 

So he follows her to the apartment he knows as well as he does his own home, observing the potted plants and framed pictures as an actual living being and not just a spectre, actually  _ feeling _ the warmth of the tea through porcelain painted a solid color,  _ tasting  _ the hot liquid on his tongue, a sweet, fruity blend that he saw her prepare countless times before. 

They sit on the couch together, close enough that his knee brushes hers, and he thinks back to all the conversations they’d had here, shadows pointing at characters to reply to her musings. 

Like those previous times, Sakura does most of the talking, unbothered that his replies are scarce. He’s a little too busy looking at her to form any coherent thought, and those half-cooked ideas are just different ways in which he could confess, because, like a coward, he didn’t ask Chouji for advice. 

He did pick up a few things from watching Chouji and his girlfriend interact, though, so he might as well try and make his second chance at life be worthwhile. “Sakura.”

She pauses mid-speech, and he can see her train of thought scattering when their eyes meet. Shikamaru gently pries the mug from her hand, depositing it on the low table with his own, and reaches for her empty hands. Sakura isn’t that much shorter than him, but she’s always been lithe and petite. As he holds her smaller hands in his own, Shikamaru marvels at how powerful they are despite their size. 

“Y-Yes?” This is when he should spill his heart out, declare his love, ask her out, but - ah, as much as he’s ready to enjoy his life to the fullest or whatever advice it was he was given, he’s too embarrassed to say it out loud so soon. There are too many words to express his gratitude, his admiration, his love, that Shikamaru decides to spread them out evenly in the days to come. 

Sakura blinks as she waits, eyes glimmering in expectation, anticipation, want. He may not have the words now, but in the dim lightning of her living room, he knows what to do. 

Shikamaru closes the distance between them to slot their lips together, soft and gentle the way she deserves. She’s suffered too much - they’ve suffered too much. A little tenderness is welcomed now, and it proves to be the right thing to be done when Sakura melts a little. He discovers he rather likes that. 

Pulling back, he tucks a lock of hair behind her ear and hums in contemplation. “What is it?” She asks, a little winded, and he shakes his head.

“Just thinking about how you aren’t a regular woman after all.” 

She quickly becomes flustered, stammering, “W-What do you mean by that!” 

Snickering, Shikamaru ducks away from the pillow she tries to hit him with, only to be tackled to the couch and silenced with another kiss. He places a hand on her spine, fingers spread open, keeping her close, and enjoys it.

* * *

The blades of grass tickle his ankle as they walk side by side, hands joined in the space between their bodies. It’s late afternoon and the weather is getting colder, though still warm enough for Sakura to wear a dress. That, or she’s giving him an excuse to wrap his arm around her when she shivers. 

She’s got flowers in the crook of her elbow, an arrangement made by Ino that was kept simple after much insistence on his part. The sight of it had left her grinning once she spotted him standing just outside the hospital, waiting for her so they could visit a place in particular.

By the time they make it, a few men are already working to remove the headstone from the ground. Shikamaru and Sakura stop a distance away to watch.

He’d been here before, always to see someone weeping over the grave. To have his empty headstone removed from this place feels like putting an end to this whole mess, a definite stop to the period of mourning, of his dad’s dull eyes and his mom’s sadness. 

Sakura squeezes his hand gently, thumb rubbing soothing circles on the back of his hand. 

“I found you here,” he says, watching the working men. Her eyes are on him. “You were wondering if I was in a good place, and I was right beside you, watching.” 

Her grip tightens, and he squeezes back. “And then?” 

“Then you said you wished to bring me back alive.” He looks down at her and smiles gently, his features softened in a way they’d never been before. “And then you did.” 

She huffs a laugh, sniffing, and buries her face in the crook of his neck. Sometimes he wonders if she’s listening for his breathing or heartbeat, to make sure this is real and not just a very long indulgent dream. He himself fears this could be just a work of his imagination. 

Ahead, the men lift the headstone and carry it down the path towards the graveyard entrance. Sakura and Shikamaru approach the empty space to stare at the square of packed earth amidst verdant grass. 

“So it’s finally over.” He sighs, a weight lifting off his shoulders as blood pumps through his veins. “This is the end.” 

“No,” Sakura lies her head on his shoulder, eyes to the sky. “It’s another beginning.” 

* * *

The summon from the Hokage comes on a Saturday morning when they’re out on a brunch date. Chouji mentioned this quaint little place to Shikamaru in one of the nicer neighborhoods, and he thought it would be a great place to take Sakura to celebrate their one month anniversary. 

Don’t let Ino hear the real reason behind it or else he’ll never know peace again.

Thankfully, they were just lounging, holding hands under the table and such when a shinobi popped up just beside their table with an urgent notice from Kakashi. Sakura threatened to kick her former teacher’s ass for ruining their time together, but her sense of duty won out in the end and they made their way to the Hokage Tower in haste.

“My favorite duo,” Kakashi says once they’re standing in front of his desk. His eyes crinkle as he smiles beneath the mask covering the lower half of his face, and he waves a scroll in the air like it’s a prize. “I have a new one for you.” 

Shikamaru actually hears when Sakura’s knuckles crack when she curls her hands into fists. 

The time to return to Kawa has finally come. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew! It's over, pals. Thanks for sticking with me and for reading! When I started it, I honestly didn't think it would get this long, but I should have expected it tbh. I have a few favorite quotes from this chapter, one of them being the one used for the summary, and the other for the twitter preview,as follows: 
> 
> _“I found you here,” he says, watching the working men. Her eyes are on him. “You were wondering if I was in a good place, and I was right beside you, watching.” _
> 
> _Her grip tightens, and he squeezes back. “And then?” _
> 
> _“Then you said you wished to bring me back alive.” He looks down at her and smiles gently, his features softened in a way they’d never been before. “And then you did.” _
> 
> Anyways, thank you again! My new year's resolution will be to tackle all the comments and get better at replying in overall. Happy holidays, my fellow shikasaku shippers! I hope each of you will have a pleasant time!

**Author's Note:**

> | [tumblr](https://chinarai.tumblr.com/) | [twitter](https://twitter.com/chinaraii) | [curious cat](https://curiouscat.me/chinarai) |


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